


A Little World Made Cunningly

by ishie



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, Gen, Locked In, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-10
Updated: 2013-03-10
Packaged: 2017-12-04 22:29:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/715810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishie/pseuds/ishie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The king lies dying, and Elaena Targaryen grows tired of waiting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little World Made Cunningly

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "locked in" square for Trope Bingo. Title from [a sonnet by John Donne](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/173364). Thanks to Jadeddiva for the beta!

"My lady," said a voice in the darkness, "the High Septon bid me wake you. He waits below."

A moment later, the fire laid in the hearth came to life, small orange flames licking through the kindling until it caught. Elaena Targaryen was disoriented for a long moment. Was this her bed? Her chamber? She had to shake off the feeling of waters closing over her head.

In the flickering light, she dressed quickly. Her hair she left unbound. There was no shame in being caught so, fresh from bed in the middle of the night. Not here. Not tonight. On another, she might not have said the same. She had to stop her hand from straying to her belly and giving all away.

"I will go down," she said. "Wake my sister. I will need her counsel, I am sure."

The stairs were narrow and steep in this part of the keep, but her feet knew the way better than her eyes. Ten years she had been imprisoned here. She knew every sloping step. Every crack in the mortar. With luck, they would in time grow as unfamiliar to her as the shores of Yi Ti. They would fade to distant memory, but here and now she was grateful to know them so well as she flew down to the hall in the dark.

The only man allowed to breach the double doors of the Maidenvault, the High Septon was short, even for his tender age. Used to craning her head to look into the blacksmith's face, she thought him smaller still. The crystal crown was far too large for him so he wore instead a jewelled seven-pointed star on his breast and a cap of rough brown cloth on his head. When he saw her enter the hall, he moved as if to bow to her before remembering his new role.

"My lady, I bring news of His Grace."

Her pulse fluttered in her chest. "Is he dead already, then?"

"No! He clings valiantly to life, long may he do so, b- by the grace of the Stranger."

"Pity," she said in a voice that reached only him.

She had shocked him, it was plain, but it seemed his training had taken root at last. After the barest of flinches, he continued on with his platitudes about the king's health and vigor as though she hadn't spoken. But his skin was as pale as clay and his hands trembled at his sides. He was not so unaffected by his situation as she had been told.

"I am sure you have done all that you can," she interrupted him to say. "My sister knows this for herself. The Hand as well, to be sure. My brother could have no better champion in his time of need, Your Holiness. I thank you for bringing these tidings and for allowing my sister to be by his side, though she is his queen no longer."

He nodded and bit his lip, so like any other young boy but for the weight of the responsibilities dragging at him. Her chest ached, suddenly. Sharply. She was suffused with the old, familiar loathing for her brother. He had never changed, not in all the years he sat upon the throne. He was as selfish and blind at the end of his life as he had been at the beginning. To bring this innocent child into his poisonous court! To pluck him from the street and anoint him with such misery! Working miracles in the light of the Seven that he alone had witnessed—it was all nonsense. The ravings of a madman, and the word of a king no one dared cross. They loved him in the commons and within the court. Loved him beyond all reason, the fools. Blinded by his piety and pity. Blinded to his faults, so like those of every man.

If she could have foreseen the fate of this child, she might never have agreed to Daena's—

"Elaena, what is it?" her other sister called. "Has Baelor...."

"He lives yet, I am assured!" She was careful to keep her voice sounding delighted. The walls she might know like the back of her own hand, but what dwelled within them was anyone's guess.

As Rhaena came into the room, trailing a sleepy-eyed maid in her wake, the High Septon began the same twitch toward a bow before checking himself. He colored brilliantly, so quickly she feared he might lose consciousness—or his dinner.

Calling to the maid, she asked that he be conveyed to a comfortable chamber. "I beg you forgive me, Your Holiness. I know you are eager to return to the king's side, and that the queen would have great comfort of you, but I could not rest easy if you left here without taking a few moments in contemplation of the Seven. Rhaena and I shall join you shortly, if you do not mind."

The relief was plain on his face as he agreed and was quickly led from the room.

Rhaena's face never broke from its placid mask. Underneath there might have been disapproval, or a grudging anger, but she would never show it. She wore a simple gown with lace at the sleeves and her hair was carefully arranged with combs fair dripping with gold. She looked for all the world as though she had been awake for hours, instead of roused in the middle of the night.

"What are you playing at, sister? I cannot see what path your scheming takes, but too well do I know your distaste for all matters of the Faith."

"We have need of an ally, that is all. Our _dear brother_ cannot cling to life forever, no matter what his slavering admirers claim in the streets."

"An ally! The High Septon he may be but he is still only a child!"

"A child who wears the crystal crown and wields enormous influence far beyond his understanding. Who is _capable_ of wielding it, in time. I mean to secure our futures, sister. At any cost."

Rhaena's mask finally cracked at this. Her eyes swept down to the hands Elaena held clasped before her.

"You cannot marry him, you know that," Rhaena said, voice dropped to a harsh whisper. "Viserys will have you wedded to someone who can secure his claim and silence the rumors. The High Septon may wield great influence and work powerful miracles, even against our uncle, but Oakenfist has nothing to call his own but a ship and an empty hold."

He had also a cousin who loved him to the ends of her being and the son or daughter growing within her. All else would come in time. Viserys had ruled long as Hand to a distracted king, but his time upon the Iron Throne would be short indeed. Had she not had assurance of that from his son, Aegon?

The kingdoms needed more stability than any man of her family could provide. She might never be queen in name, it was true, but whatever else her lot in life, she was a dragon as much as any of them. She would do what needed done to keep the kingdoms secure. To keep her burgeoning family safe.

But Rhaena would care nothing for any of that. She kept close to the words of her faith, honoring honesty and piety above everything else, even her own safety. 

Elaena took her sister's arm. "Do not worry so. Come, let us join the child in his prayers. You can both scold me for forgetting the words of the Stranger's lament, until the king has need of him again."

And when the king needed nothing of this world any longer, they would raise their voices to the gods in thanks for their freedom, so hard won at last.


End file.
